Breakfast Recipes

Asoka Halwa

Asoka Halwa is very famous in Tanjavur(Especially in Thiruvaiyaru) and in rest of tamil nadu and this is one of the sweet which will be made for most of the occassions in some of the brahmin familes. Usually the food colour powder will be added to get a halwa in attractive colour, but i didn't add it and i prefer not to add the artificial colouring. There are couple of methods to make this dish, but I prefer the below way where in i am preparing the sugar syrup with one string consistency which helps me to make this halwa quickly when compared to other methods. Let me start the recipe with few cautions

1. Preparing halwa needs lots of patience as our hands will cry of pain. (Halwana summava ;-).
2. You should be very careful and stir it continuously otherwise the halwa get burnt and spoil your dish !
3. We should be generous in using the ghee. Anti-Calorie people should forgive me for publishing this. The Halwa should be smooth and melt in your mouth and this can be possible only with the help of Ghee.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

-

Cooking Time

60 mins

Asoka Halwa

Ingredients:

Moong Dal

1/2 Cup

Wheat Flour

1/2 Cup

Sugar

1 Cup

Ghee

1/2 Cup

Cashews

15

Method:

Take a heavy bottomed pan, add the moong dal to fry it.

Dry fry the moong dal till it turns light red in color. The reason we fry the moong dal is that, the dal will cook easiliy and quickly with little water. Also the aroma will be very good.

Take the fried dal in a vessel and pour water till the dals are soaked and allow for 3-4 whistles in pressure cooker

After we are able to open the pressure cooker, take the dal and smash it nicely.

(Optional) If the dal is not smashed nicely in the previous step, then get it smashed to a thick paste using the blender/Mixer. Take the cooked moong dal in a blender and grind it to a thick paste without adding water.

Meanwhile, heat the kadai and add 1 tablespoon of ghee and fry the cashews till they turn golden brown color. Take the fried cashews in a plate and keep it aside

In the same pan use the ghee that we used for frying the cashews for frying the wheat flour. Add the wheat flour and fry it till it turns light brown color. We don't need to fry it too much till it turns red color. The ghee after frying the cashews is enough for frying the wheat flour. Take the fried wheat flour in a plate and keep it aside

Now lets start making the sugar syrup. Add sugar to the pan and add water till the sugar is soaked(I poured 1/2 cup of water)

Keep stirring till the sugar gets dissolved and we get a thin 1 string consistency. If you take a drop of sugar syrup and rub it between the fingers it should form like a string.

Now add the fried wheat flour and keep stirring

When the wheat flour mixture gets thicker in the sugar syrup, add the moong dal smashed paste and break the dough evenly without forming lumps. If the mixture gets very thick, then you can add little milk and stir continiously.

Keep stirring the halwa. Whenever the mixture stick more on the pan, add ghee and start stirring again. We need to keep on stirring continuously in a medium flame though we feel pain in our hands :(. Atleast we need to stir for 30 minutes to make the halwa cook completely and becomes thicker

Add ghee in regular intervals and keep stirring, till the ghee oozes out of halwa and the halwa rolls like a ball without sticking on the sides of pan. Add cashews and mix well

Finally add the remaining ghee and switch off the flame.

The delicious Asoka Halwa is ready to serve. We can store in a air tight container and whenever we need to serve, we can reheat the halwa to melt the ghee and then we can serve

Tips:

We can use Samba wheat flour which gives very good flavour when compared to normal wheat flour

We can also use all purpose flour. But wheat flour has its own flavour and brings a unique taste to the halwa

The cooked moong dal should not have any water. If we are not able to smash nicely, we can grind it in a mixer to a thick paste without adding water

If the sugar dissolved in water is dirty, then we can add 1 tablespoon of milk which will make the dirt in the sugar syrup raises up in the water and we can easily remove the dust

We can add kesar powder after we add the smashed and cooked moong dal and we stir completely and break all the lumps.

We can also mix the kesar powder, saffron threads in little milk and mix with the halwa to get lighter color rather than adding the color directly which will make the color very bright

We can also grate/chop the badams and fry it in ghee and add it to the halwa

Immediately after adding the smashed dal, if the mixture becomes very thick, add little milk and stir continuously

Home Maker. Born in a Brahmin family in Kallidaikurichi, Tirunelveli District. Inherited the secret of making tastier brahmin recipes from her mom and mother in law. Expertise in preparing Tirunelveli, Nagercoil and Kerala Food Stuffs.Now settled in Chennai with my son and daughter-in-law. Along with my DIL Sowmya Venkatachalam, I publish all the recipes. Sowmya is now fully taken up the responsibility and I am guiding her as she has a lot of passion to cooking.